SMB Server Migration

[Fernan Lopez]

Hi, there . As I'm newbie here i'll give some background
I work as IT Support in a local electronic and home stuff supplier. And also supporting a small Shipagent and broker company (small Office with 10 Workstations). There i get an old Windows SBS 2003 environment which I'm planning to migrate, due to recent end of life for SBS2003. I'm a bit stucked as microsoft is no longer giving any alternative to SBS. So this is my actual configuration. I'd really appreciate any advice or suggest

Actual Prod Environment

Server1 (server01)
Hardware
IBM X3200 M4 Server with Intel Xeon Dual Core
2x 250Gb SATA Disks in RAID 1.
DIMM 4Gb Installed Memory
Now this Prod Server is running:
SBS 2003 with SP2
roles:
AD DS
DHCP
DNS
MS Exchange 2003 with SP2
(Download google apps accounts into ExchSrv through pop3 to exchg application )
File Server (Only shared folders)

Server2 (sqlsrv) - New One
Hardware
HP ML110 Gen9
2 x 2TB SATA Disk in RAID 1
DIMM 2x4GB 1333
Now this Prod Server is running;
Server 2012 R2
SQL Server 2008 R2 (Database server)


Now i want to demote SBS Server and migrate my domain controller to Srv 2012 R2
And DNS, DHCP Roles
What should i do ?
Virtualize DC with HyperV?
What about Mail server, maybe a VM running Zimbra or something?
What should i do with the old one? Maybe DC replica (2008R2) or File server instead?

Thanks a lot.

 

[GaryD9]

The path from SBS is Server Essentials. You lose Exchange in the process. There are several posts across the internet detailing the migration steps. (google "migrate SBS to Essentials 2012 R2". Here's one on the first page of results: Windows Server 2012 R2 Essentials Migration – Keys to Success)

Spend a few minutes understanding what Essentials is missing relative to SBS. As well as Exchange (because MS wants to migrate people to Office365 - in my case, I migrated to "google apps for work" just to spite MS), there might be one or two other things that you'd have to install a role for. You can still use Exchange, of course, but you'd need separate licensing (and preferably a different machine/vm)

If you've already made purchases (including CALs), you can also install the "essentials" role directly on full 2012 R2 Standard.

It's perfectly fine to install the "DC" (it's not called that anymore) in a VM. Google around for some tips on doing that... (don't use hyper-v time sync, don't take snapshots of the VM, etc.)

 

[GaryD9]

One more tidbit of advice: Don't migrate directly from SBS to Essentials if you only have 10 users. SBS created a ton of policies and groups that aren't really used with Essentials (which uses different policies and groups.. heh.) When FIRST migrated from SBS to essentials (home network with a whopping 4 users) I did a plain migration. After a few weeks, I pulled everything off the domain and did it all from scratch with essentials.

 

[Fernan Lopez]

Hi, there thanks for the reply
One question when you say

I pulled everything off the domain and did it all from scratch with essentials.

You mean making a "fresh new" AD installation and set again each user and policy?
Main problem with this is that i need to rebuild each user profile setting (incluiding Outlook Profile, Google, IE, Printers, etc) when i join them to the new domain

 

[GaryD9]

You mean making a "fresh new" AD installation and set again each user and policy?
Main problem with this is that i need to rebuild each user profile setting (incluiding Outlook Profile, Google, IE, Printers, etc) when i join them to the new domain

Yep, completely rebuilt them. In my case, it was a Good Thing, as the SBS domain was my first go-around with active directory, domain policies, etc - so there was a lot of cruft in there for me to clean out. As well, with a only 4 users, it wasn't difficult. One policy set for my kids, one for my wife and I. One policy for wifi-only machines (so they connect to my home EAP AP even if the machine isn't logged on - which facilitates nightly backups over wifi.)

 

[Fernan Lopez]

It seems to be a good way , first I would try migration in a lab. It's about 15 users including special users for shared folders, and It's such a lot of work rejoining each computer to new domain. Do you think i should set Srv 2008R2 for the virtualized domain?

 

[GaryD9]

Do you think i should set Srv 2008R2 for the virtualized domain?

I don't understand what you mean by "virtualized domain"

 

[manxam]

In answer to virtualizing the DC... Virtualize everything! A DC guest, an "App" guest, and whatever linux server you're planning on using for email. This way, the OS' become hardware agnostic and this makes it VERY easy to migrate these to a new host in the event of a hardware failure. You can spin up pretty much any computer / server with hyper-v free, import the VMs and go about your day until the new hardware arrives.

 

[Diavuno]

I would virtualize the old box for archive purposes.
Then migrate the DC from the physical to the newer box.

remap whatever shares you might have (with 10 machines its easy

2003 went end of life a couple years ago, I would get it off the network like yesterday.


I just did a 2008sbs to 2016essentials a couple weeks ago, it took maybe 2 hours. (excluding the transfer of files on the "D" drive)

 

[Fernan Lopez]

I would virtualize the old box for archive purposes.
Then migrate the DC from the physical to the newer box.

remap whatever shares you might have (with 10 machines its easy

2003 went end of life a couple years ago, I would get it off the network like yesterday.


I just did a 2008sbs to 2016essentials a couple weeks ago, it took maybe 2 hours. (excluding the transfer of files on the "D" drive)

What's the best solution to p2v the old box? I've read that it's only working with vCenter..

 

[Diavuno]

What's the best solution to p2v the old box? I've read that it's only working with vCenter..

VMware convertor works fine, just point it directly to the host.

VMware vCenter Converter: P2V Virtual Machine Converter
It's free, just create an account on their website.

Sometimes it needs to be installed locally to run properly.